"Virgin River" Season 5, Part 1 ended Sept. 7 with the usual cliffhangers and a couple shocking reveals. The second half of Season 5, which consists of two Christmas-themed episodes, drops Nov. 30 on Netflix. But don't let the holiday cheer fool you. The upcoming episodes will answer some of the biggest questions in "Virgin River" history, said showrunner and executive producer Patrick Sean Smith.
Warning: Major spoilers ahead for "Virgin River" Season 5, Part 1.
There's the mystery of Mel's birth father, for starters. Part 2 sees Mel and Jack on a scavenger hunt to find her biological father. Their only hint is a letter signed "Champ."
"It's a clue in the holiday episodes, and it's the only thing that Mel really has to go off of," Smith said in an Oct. 3 interview with Glamour. While the showrunner did not reveal whether the audience has met Mel's dad yet, he noted that we can rule out Jack's father. Phew.
And don't get your hopes up for Jack and Mel's winter wonderland nuptials. The pair won't be tying the knot in the holiday episodes, which begin with a time-jump from Labor Day to Christmas. Smith hinted that Charmaine's twins might finally take their first breaths, saying, "You may or may not get a birth or two."
Calvin was revealed as the father of Charmaine's twins in the Part 1 finale, and fans can expect the series to dig into their history both in Part 2 and the already-greenlit Season 6. "We'll give some hints in the holiday episodes, and then in Season 6 we'll explore it more deeply and it will be a bit more of its own story engine."
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As for that reveal, Smith said that the "Virgin River" writers didn't initially know who the father of Charmaine's twins would be. They tossed around Mike and Brady, but landed on Calvin due to his connection with Jack.
"It just made sense that if Charmaine was in a place of desperation and wanted to hurt Jack, that going to his archenemy and hooking up with him would make the most sense," Smith told the outlet, adding that a crucial line in a previous season supported their Calvin shocker: "There's one scene where Charmaine mentioned that she was going to this part of town where Calvin always [is]."
While there are no present plans for flashbacks to Charmaine and Calvin's fling, Smith hasn't ruled it out entirely. He also noted that fans will "understand more what was going on with the Todd situation" in Part 2.
Smith also divulged the details on Lizzie's shocking pregnancy, which may or may not be a false alarm. While she gets pregnant in Robyn Carr's "Virgin River" novel series on which the show is based, the writers didn't know that until they had pitched the idea themselves.
"A lot of times over the season we would say, 'Oh, let's do X,' and then we check the books only to see, 'Oh, my gosh, that happened,'" said Smith. "Like Lizzie getting pregnant in the books. So it's always like an extra check when we start to head in that direction to know that it's also honoring the spirit of the books, but not hamstringing ourselves to only capturing what the books did."
Elsewhere, the November holiday episodes will pick up with Brie and Mike, and Brady and Lark, in more advanced stages of their relationships. Fans should "be worried" about Preacher, Smith added, now that the Wes plot line has come to the fore again.
As it stands in the immediate aftermath of the writers' strike, the "Virgin River" team are ready to pen the second half of Season 6. Season 7 has not yet been greenlit.
"Virgin River" Season 5, Part 2 drops Nov. 30 on Netflix.
